David Buchholz

13 July 2021

For “Heal Your Headache” Fans!

Heal Your Headache: The 1-2-3 Program for Taking Charge of Your Headaches by Dr. David Buchholz is one of the most popular books on migraine treatment. For over 15 years it has helped many migraine patients fight their headaches.

Because the book has been around so long, you may not be aware of some of the “fans” that are out there. And if you don’t know about the Dizzy Cook, you’re certainly missing out.

Yes, the Dizzy Cook is a person – Alicia Wolf, who, as you might guess, has chronic vestibular migraine. Having great success with the Heal Your Headache system, she decided to provide resources for others who are in the same boat. And so, out came The Dizzy Cook: Managing Migraine with More Than 90 Comforting Recipes and Lifestyle Tips, available in paperback, hardcover, and eBook. Add this book to Dr. Buchholz’ work and you’ll have a lot of resources and updated tips – and, of course, my favourite, more recipes!

I love a cook book I can hold in my hand, although I use eBooks as well. But there are also resources on Alicia’s website. A sampling of fun and colourful recipes, to start with. Lots of tips for people with migraine, and especially vestibular migraine (of course). And some clever products, such as “Kiss the Dizzy Cook” aprons, and an MSG kitchen towel (MSG stands for Migraine Super Goddess, of course!).

But, for those who know they need to eat better, but can never remember how to cook an egg, Alicia even provides group or one-on-one consultations to help you plan a meal or learn some cooking tricks.

So anyone with migraine, especially if you are a fan of Heal Your Headache, and especially especially if you suffer from vestibular migraine, needs to check out The Dizzy Cook, and grab a copy of Alicia’s cookbook here.

1 September 2012

Can I be Migraine-Free and still eat Cheese?

James Tips 14

Cheese seems to be pretty high up on the list of foods to avoid when you’re a migraine patient. But as with anything related to migraine, it ain’t so simple.

First of all, my list isn’t your list. Just because cheese triggers and attack in Josh, there’s no proof that it may trigger an attack in Ashley.

The common theory when it comes to cheese is that it contains tyramine, an organic compound in a lot of foods that may trigger migraine attacks. Many migraine patients have tried a low-tyramine diet, and many have been helped by it.

Is there cheese that's safe for a migraine patient?

But here’s the catch – some cheeses are super-high in tyramine, others are not. Don’t just "avoid cheese" – there are many cheeses that may not bother you at all. (Of course, if you’re avoiding dairy altogether, skip the rest of this article and read this.)

Worst Offenders

The cheeses that are aged tend to be the worst offenders. From What Your Doctor May NOT Tell You About Migraines, here is a list of the common cheeses that are high tyramine, the worst first:

English Stilton
Blue cheese
Sharp (old) Cheddar
Danish blue
Mozzarella
Swiss Gruyère
Feta
Parmesan
Gorgonzola

Others that are often listed are Boursault, Boursin, Brie, Colby, Emmenthaler, Camembert, Gouda, Muenster, Provolone, Romano, Roquefort, and Swiss.

Now, there’s a bit of a fight over whether or not mozzarella should be on the list – particularly because people love their pizza. So we’ll talk more about mozza in a moment.

Safer Cheeses

So, did the list above seem kind of long? In the book Heal Your Headache, Dr. Buchholz offers this list of cheeses that are fairly low in tyramine.

Cottage cheese
Ricotta
Cream Cheese
(good quality) American cheese

The key here is fresh – young cheeses tend to have less tyramine. Go to your local cheese shop and see what fresh cheeses they offer – you might find a new love. You also might get away with some processed cheeses, such as Cheese Wiz, but I’m not into recommending a lot of processed food when it comes to migraine. And frankly, some processed cheeses are real serious migraine triggers.

And back to mozzarella. Different tests of mozza have led to different results, which is why you sometimes see it as a cheese to avoid, and sometimes as a safe cheese. For most, if you think cheese with tyramine may be a problem, it’s probably wise to err on the side of caution, and then carefully add it back into your diet later. Fresh goat cheese may be another one to try after a while

So, yes, you may be able to eat cheese. Maybe for you, cheese isn’t a problem at all. But if you’ve found a connection between cheese and your migraine attacks, try avoiding the worst offenders for a while and keep track in your migraine diary.

2 June 2009

Major shift in Migraine Thought? (part 1)

James Discoveries & Stats, Information 4

There seems to be a major shift taking place in the medical world when it comes to migraine. It’s actually been going on for many years, and it will probably continue for many years to come, but many people are still unaware of it.

At the heart of the shift is the question of just how widespread migraine is. It’s not going to come as a shock that this is confusing to many people. Some people still think of migraine as a bad headache. Others don’t realize that it’s possible to have a mild migraine attack. Others are still confused about basic terms, like cluster headache, migraine, sinus headache, and so on.

The "Common" Headache?

Before we talk any more about migraine, probably the best thing to do is go back and talk about the common headache. Most people generally think of the most common type of headache as the tension headache (now more properly called the tension-type headache).

It might surprise you to know that we actually know very little about what a tension-type headache really is.

Wait a minute now – you just get tense, stressed, muscles get tense for one reason or another – you get a headache. What can be simpler than that?

It seemed that simple, until researchers actually started to investigate the actual muscle tension in the so-called tension headache. The surprise result was that a lot of people were getting the headache without any muscle tension at all!

Hence the name change.

Is it psychological? Well, some psychological factors seem to influence some headaches, but there have been no consistent findings that show that the common headache is due to psychological factors. In other words, people with fewer anxiety or mood problems do not get fewer headaches.

So in the end, we know even less about tension-type headache (TTH) than migraine! And just like migraine, we don’t know what causes TTH.

So, could TTH be connected somehow to migraine? Currently we’re usually looking at symptoms and ruling out other causes before we put a headache and other symptoms into a category of migraine or TTH. But what if many of the migraine attacks and TTH attacks actually had the same root cause?

What if the common headache was actually migraine?

A shift of thought

Many specialists are becoming convinced that most of the headaches out there are actually coming from migraine. And this changing opinion is showing up in popular literature about migraine. Take for example:

I was taught – as most doctors were taught, and still believe – that tension headache accounts for the vast majority of chronic headaches … Migraine, not muscle contraction, is what causes headache ascribed to tension. These mild-to-moderate, nonspecific headaches stem from low-level activation of the mechanism of migraine … it arises from a single mechanism, but since the degree of activation fluctuates, it is expressed to varying extents and in many different ways.

Dr. David Buchholz, Heal Your Headache

While it is true that an unlucky few have common migraine as well as hypnic headache, or both hemicrania continua and cluster headaches, such cases are extremely rare. What most of us construe as "different headaches" are actually different presentations of one headache type, and that is usually migraine … The overwhelming majority of headache patients have one kind of headache and, usually, that is migraine. Migraine is by far the most common kind of headache.

Dr. Robert Cowan, The Keeler Migraine Method

This shift in thought has huge implications for research, treatment … and for you. And we’ll talk more about that in part 2.